SYLVIA NICOLAIDES

HANGING

In 1807, February 24th, three convicted murderers were to be executed in London: Owen Haggerty, John Holloway, and Elizabeth Godfrey. The fact that three people were going to be executed, one of which a woman, was extremely unusual, drawing a huge crowd. at the point of hysteria. In the end, 27 people died and 70 were sent to the hospital with serious injuries. Alhough that magnitude of injury was unusual, the excitement over public executions was not.

In 1914. in the public execution of John Feltovic, aged 19, in Connecticut for a storekeeper's murder, one newspaper reported:

"With the fall of the hanged man from his rocket trip toward the high ceiling of the pale blue walled chamber, a horse sigh broke the awful silence. Rapidly accompanied by convulsive shudders on the part of the hanged man, sigh after sigh tore through the rope-constricted neck.''

'Hanging' is a video installation where two feet suspending from the ceiling shows the moment of a dying man convulsing until the imminent death, placing the audience in the position of the viewing crowd.